Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
by lanternemagique
Summary: Lord Voldemort gives Draco the mission to go spy on Harry. He sends Snape to spy on Draco. And he sends Nagini to spy on Snape and Draco.


I wrote this in the past couple of days to deal with the waiting for the final book. It's my first fanfic, and maybe my last... I don't know, we'll see.

About the story: I guess it doesn't seem plausible they'll be at the Malfoy mansion, but you will see why I found this an appealing place.

Disclaimer: this is fanfiction! Obviously, I took the characters and general background from Rowling! I'm not trying to make money off it, either... Thanks for reading!!

**Chapter 1: Many Spies**

Holding Draco by the scruff of the neck, Snape pushed him roughly inside the living room of the Malfoy mansion.

Draco's eyes first met Fenrir, who grinned at Snape on his way out, as if he had beat him to something. But he got out of Snape's way rapidly, and disapparated behind his back. Still sensing a deathlike revulsion all through his skin at Fenrir's departure, Draco next caught sight of Voldemort at the far end of the dining table: sitting, waiting, in his father's tall mahogany and silver armchair... as if on a throne, lording it over his parents' house. The long pale fingers with their blood red fingernails were smoothly tracing a silver snake protruding in bas relief on the side of the armrest.

Draco's mother stooped on a small side chair to the right by the wall, near Voldemort's end of the table, transfixed, awkwardly dressed for the occasion in her rich silver and teal moiré wedding cloak studded with galleon sized diamonds and emeralds carved like eyes, flashing cutting green light. Draco had never seen her wear that dress, except in a picture. Narcissa, flushing as Draco looked in her direction, tried not to look up, even as she caught sight of him approaching through the corner of her eye. Draco blocked his thoughts at this sight before they could form as he sensed Voldemort's silent, inquisitive, burning eyes fixed on him.

"My Lord," Snape began, but Voldemort cut him off "I'll talk to you later. Draco, move closer, let me look at you."

Draco would rather not, but took two steps towards the end of the table, and stopped, looking down, keeping a firm lid on the memory of Dumbledore's questions, and his own desperate answers, which began bubbling to the surface with each step, as if responding to an imminent, imperious need, pushing to escape at the edges... Draco forced his silence on them like a hat.

Voldemort's slit nostrils twitched, irked, sensing barriers. His fingers moved on the sculpted snakes.

"I was just talking to your mother about your father." He watched Draco. "I want to free your father."

For an unguarded second, Draco leaned towards the Dark Lord, hopeful. "You are not a killer, Draco," Dumbledore's kind voice echoed to him before he could stop it. Draco seized himself, looked up and saw the Dark Lord's eyes trained on him, hungry, intelligent. Voldemort's deathly fingers continued to caress the sculpted snake on the throne, and an overwhelming sensation dawned on Draco as he took in his surroundings: the chair, the mansion, and even the woman, his mother, belonged as of now to the Dark Lord. Fat chance for Voldemort to bring his father home.

"That is the prize I will offer you," Voldemort interrupted as if to counter Draco's unspoken doubt "but you must make no mistakes. No hesitation. You must not..." Voldemort made a pause "disappoint me."

A new mission, realized Draco. He tried not to see his mother, in her cloak.

"Snape will teach you the fine art of... infiltrating --" Draco felt his mind released from the wrench, and Voldemort's attention turned elsewhere. Snape approached silently from behind, but Voldemort continued talking to Draco. "You must spy on Harry Potter, Draco. I want to know where he is, what he does, and most importantly, what he knows. You have -- some talents, Draco, I see..."

A short, fat, cringing man apparated at Voldemort's side.

"Wormtail, lead Draco to his bedroom."

Draco, slapped by this abrupt and indirect dismissal, stared in disgust at the cringing figure that Voldemort had chosen to show him the way in his own house. He recoiled at the touch of Wormtail's hairy fingers that grabbed and pushed him with determination out of the room. With Voldemort as man of the house in his parents' home, and Wormtail as personal chaperone, Draco's glamorous idea of serving the Dark Lord had shrunk to a reality not much to his taste. The door closed behind him, and Voldemort looked at Snape. He seemed to be making a decision.

"Keep an eye on Draco. He seems weak. If he gets too weak, I'll rely on you to --" An involuntary gasp issued from Narcissa. Voldemort turned. "I don't think we need Wormtail around anymore, Severus." Snape registered the use of his first name. "We have a foolish woman here to do all the cringing for us in the appropriate places..." Snape watched Narcissa straighten her back, and consciously freeze her face and eyes in statuesque expressionlessness. Voldemort laughed, turning to Snape: "At least she can pretend, when she wants to, not to be weak" -- the word weak hissed forth like a spray of ice. "But we must not ask for too much -- if I demanded that all my Death Eaters be perfect..." He paused for effect.

"Even the best leave much -- to be desired. There was something else, what am I forgetting?" Voldemort continued with rather theatrical speed, and suspenseful pretense at searching his memory, holding his eyes on Snape. "Ah, Draco! He might need your -- help. Give him -- hints. He needs -- your ideas. He doesn't seem -- very capable..."

"Yes, my Lord" Snape answered shortly, every pause of Voldemort's grating on his nerves, like so many allusions to Snape's questionable, though not entirely unwelcome, initiative. Bellatrix must be satisfied now she went blabbing to the Dark Lord. It didn't seem to have helped her get any nearer to him, though, he noted with a smirk.

"I value obedience highly," Voldemort's deathly voice rose to a threatening pitch "but I can't deny that I am pleased with the outcome, Severus. Draco might have ruined all..."

This was the final straw. Narcissa choked through her transfixed posture and trained her angry stare on Voldemort. After hearing from Fenrir the report of all that Draco had managed to do, when it was obvious Draco had done all but one thing, the easiest thing for Snape to do -- to have the Dark Lord refuse to acknowledge the merit, to refuse reward... But as she sensed that Voldemort became alert to her feelings, Narcissa stopped in her tracks, scared of giving the Dark Lord a wide view into her mind. She feared giving Voldemort fresh ideas of punishment and humiliation aimed at demonstrating the magnitude of his present indulgence.

Snape watched Narcissa as she lowered her imposing blond head and kept her thoughts shut. Voldemort had commanded her to sit perpetually by his side, as "personal consultant in the highest matters," the same day he had sent Bellatrix packing to South America to recruit followers. Narcissa could still see Bellatrix's eyes widening with shock and narrowing with venomous anger and suspicion at seeing this arrangement, this elevation of a traitor ("as good as"), while she was given the boot. She had stared at Narcissa in disbelief, as if her blond sister had stolen from her the most precious, the most desirable treasure that was rightfully hers, Voldemort's endless presence.

Voldemort's grotesque satisfaction at the power of forcing Narcissa to be constantly at his side, dressed in her Gringotts worthy wedding cloak, was obvious: stealing the trophy wife from Lucius, feeding like a Dementor off her last remnants of human feeling, misery and resistance, delectating in observing her barely mastered agonized reactions to Draco's danger: Bellatrix's cloying devotion could not compete with these refined attractions. The Dark Lord was making a mistake, Snape saw. He was not like the last time. He was turning too many of his closest followers against him. He seemed less powerful and more... brutal. An intake of breath from Narcissa alerted Snape to the appearance of the hissing Nagini by her side.

The snake's slithering gave Narcissa the creeps, when it came thus upon her out of nowhere. Nagini slid ever so slowly over the top of Narcissa's left shoe as if bid to do so by Voldemort, and moved towards the master's chair. Voldemort began to hiss at the snake, in the presence of Snape, and the snake hissed in return. While showing no hint of understanding the exchange, Snape, looking straight ahead, followed the conversation. He made out every word of Parseltongue, having learned to listen to it from a recluse old Parselmouth in South Surrey. Feeling as if he had stolen a treasure he was not entitled to, he had kept his acquired skill a secret from everyone, even the Dark Lord, everyone except Dumbledore, for whom he had translated the memories of the Gaunts.

"Draco" hissed Nagini. "Draco smells sweet. The Lord promised fresh meat if Draco should fail... Draco--"

"Not yet" hissed back Voldemort. "Don't you like Snape?"

He watched with a broadening grin as Nagini's head swung around and sniffed the air in Snape's direction. She turned back toward Voldemort, without commenting. Snape blocked his thoughts of contempt and kept his facial features free of sneer. He was beyond the age where such buffoonery might intimidate him and impress him as formidable leadership. Like Dumbledore, the Dark Lord had been great once. But he was losing his grip. Voldemort appeared to guess Snape could understand Parseltongue; this was not his first coarse attempt at taunting it out of him.

"Go where I told you, Nagini, and wait there. Tell me everything you see and hear. Keep an eye on Harry Potter. And -- the others."

"Harry Potter!" Nagini's hiss was ecstatic. "You promised Harry Potter. How soon can I eat Harry Potter? He has superior blood. Just like the Dark Lord. But Harry's flesh smells sweet, fresh, better than --"

Snape watched Voldemort's face turn cadaveric gray. The hissing conversation was not turning to his liking. Nagini sensed it, stopping in mid hiss.

"Not yet. Not Harry. Do your job, Nagini, and you'll have -- Wormtail -- soon."

Nagini lowered her head and slithered out of the room, hiding her snake thoughts as best she could.


End file.
